Elon Musk Is a Huckster
Oct 14, 2026
The world's richest man built his fortune on hype, exaggerations, and lies. Whenever the market catches on to a broken promise, Musk tells a new, more grandiose story to pump his stock price and restore his image as a visionary.

We’re going all the way to Mars, I think. Best case, ten years, worst case 15-20 years.

The SpaceX Starship has only had 13 test flights and is nowhere near ready to reach Mars.

In ~2 years, summon should work anywhere connected by land & not blocked by borders, eg you're in LA and the car is in NY.

Ten years later, Tesla says summon works “within approximately 65 meters."

You will also be able to add your car to the Tesla shared fleet just by tapping a button on the Tesla phone app and have it generate income for you while you're at work or on vacation, significantly offsetting and at times potentially exceeding the monthly loan or lease cost.

Ten years later, there is no Tesla shared fleet of taxis to generate income for owners.

Just received verbal govt approval for The Boring Company to build an underground NY-Phil-Balt-DC Hyperloop. NY-DC in 29 mins.

Nine years years later, not a single hyperloop has been built.

[The Roadster 2] has all that functionality, with four seats. And available - expected this to be available - in 2020.

Nine years later, Musk stated that "We may be able to debut that in a month or so." It still has not been demoed.

November or December of this year, we should be able to go from a parking lot in California to a parking lot in New York, no controls touched at any point during the entire journey.

Despite repeating this promise many times since then – Tesla has not delivered full self-driving.

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk says the first passenger on a private space flight around the moon will be a Japanese billionaire...The mission is scheduled to launch in 2023.

In 2024, the flight was canceled due to delays in the SpaceX Starship program.

New Boring Company merch coming soon. Lifesize LEGO-like interlocking bricks…Rated for California seismic loads, so super strong, but bored in the middle, like an aircraft wing spar, so not heavy…with a precise surface finish, so two people could build the outer walls of a small house in a day or so.

This "merch coming soon" was never sold.

[N]ext year for sure, we will have over a million robotaxis on the road. The fleet wakes up with an over-the-air update. That’s all it takes.

Tesla never turned existing cars into robotaxis.

I think the most profound thing is that if you buy a Tesla today, I believe you are buying an appreciating asset – not a depreciating asset.

A Tesla purchased in 2019 has lost over 50% of its value since then.

We do see Tesla reaching 20M vehicles/year probably before 2030, but that requires consistently excellent execution.

Deliveries shrunk to 1.6M in 2025 - 92% short of forecast.

We have a shot of being in production for version one of Optimus hopefully next year.

Four years later, Musk's robot is still not in production.

…[I]t takes about a year to ramp up production…we're tentatively aiming for 50,000 units in 2024 for Tesla Semi in North America.

Volume production didn't even begin until 2026, and is unlikely to hit 50,000 units in 2027.

I'd say a quarter million [Cybertrucks sold] a year is a reasonable guess and it might be 500,000, I don't know.

Cox Automotive / Kelley Blue Book reported that Tesla sold only 20,000 Cybertrucks in 2025.

Logan Kilpatrick: How long until [Artificial General Intelligence]?

Elon Musk: Next year

In December 2025, Musk changed his prediction to 2026.

With our lower-cost vehicles, with the advent of autonomy, something like a 20% to 30% [sales] growth next year is my best guess.

In 2025, Tesla auto deliveries actually shrunk by 9%.

Howard Lutnick: But we set up DOGE - how much do you think we can rip out of this wasted $6.5 trillion Harris/Biden budget?

Elon Musk: Well I think we can do at least $2 trillion.

Musk missed his target by $2.5T, as government spending increased to $7.0T in fiscal year 2025.

I believe half of the population of the US will be covered by Tesla’s Robotaxi by the end of the year.

By the end of 2025, the Robotaxi operated fewer than 200 cars in just two cities.

SpaceX has already shifted focus to building a self-growing city on the Moon, as we can potentially achieve that in less than 10 years...SpaceX will also strive to build a Mars city and begin doing so in about 5 to 7 years.

You don’t seem to understand that SpaceX will be worth more than the rest of Earth if we accomplish our goals.

My prediction is that Optimus will be the biggest product of all time by far. Nothing will even be close. I think it'll be ten times bigger than the next biggest product ever made.

[F]ive years from now, my prediction is we will launch and be operating every year more AI in space than the cumulative total on Earth. I would expect it to be at least...a few hundred gigawatts per year.

The interviewer noted that just 100 gigawatts would require 10,000 Starship launches per year. In four years of tests, SpaceX has launched Starship 13 times.

We’re going all the way to Mars, I think. Best case, ten years, worst case 15-20 years.

SOURCE
https://www.wsj.com/articles/BL-VCDB-10984
The SpaceX Starship has only had 13 test flights and is nowhere near ready to reach Mars.

In ~2 years, summon should work anywhere connected by land & not blocked by borders, eg you're in LA and the car is in NY.

SOURCE
https://x.com/elonmusk/status/686279251293777920?lang=en
Ten years later, Tesla says summon works “within approximately 65 meters."

You will also be able to add your car to the Tesla shared fleet just by tapping a button on the Tesla phone app and have it generate income for you while you're at work or on vacation, significantly offsetting and at times potentially exceeding the monthly loan or lease cost.

SOURCE
https://www.tesla.com/master-plan-part-deux
Ten years later, there is no Tesla shared fleet of taxis to generate income for owners.

Just received verbal govt approval for The Boring Company to build an underground NY-Phil-Balt-DC Hyperloop. NY-DC in 29 mins.

SOURCE
https://x.com/elonmusk/status/888053175155949572
Nine years years later, not a single hyperloop has been built.

[The Roadster 2] has all that functionality, with four seats. And available - expected this to be available - in 2020.

SOURCE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q-Okl0iWQnY
Nine years later, Musk stated that "We may be able to debut that in a month or so." It still has not been demoed.

November or December of this year, we should be able to go from a parking lot in California to a parking lot in New York, no controls touched at any point during the entire journey.

SOURCE
https://blog.ted.com/what-will-the-future-look-like-elon-musk-speaks-at-ted2017/
Despite repeating this promise many times since then – Tesla has not delivered full self-driving.

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk says the first passenger on a private space flight around the moon will be a Japanese billionaire...The mission is scheduled to launch in 2023.

SOURCE
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/09/18/elon-musk-spacex-sending-japan-mogul-maezawa-on-private-space-flight.html
In 2024, the flight was canceled due to delays in the SpaceX Starship program.

New Boring Company merch coming soon. Lifesize LEGO-like interlocking bricks…Rated for California seismic loads, so super strong, but bored in the middle, like an aircraft wing spar, so not heavy…with a precise surface finish, so two people could build the outer walls of a small house in a day or so.

SOURCE
https://x.com/elonmusk/status/978140940241059840?lang=en https://x.com/elonmusk/status/978147162319085569
This "merch coming soon" was never sold.

[N]ext year for sure, we will have over a million robotaxis on the road. The fleet wakes up with an over-the-air update. That’s all it takes.

SOURCE
https://techcrunch.com/2019/04/22/tesla-plans-to-launch-a-robotaxi-network-in-2020/
Tesla never turned existing cars into robotaxis.

I think the most profound thing is that if you buy a Tesla today, I believe you are buying an appreciating asset – not a depreciating asset.

SOURCE
https://electrek.co/2025/03/18/elon-musk-biggest-lie-tesla-vehicles-appreciating-assets/
A Tesla purchased in 2019 has lost over 50% of its value since then.

We do see Tesla reaching 20M vehicles/year probably before 2030, but that requires consistently excellent execution.

SOURCE
https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1310486616075579393
Deliveries shrunk to 1.6M in 2025 - 92% short of forecast.

We have a shot of being in production for version one of Optimus hopefully next year.

SOURCE
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/08/elon-musk-says-tesla-is-aiming-to-start-production-on-optimus-next-year.html
Four years later, Musk's robot is still not in production.

…[I]t takes about a year to ramp up production…we're tentatively aiming for 50,000 units in 2024 for Tesla Semi in North America.

SOURCE
https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-semi-volume-production-late-2024/
Volume production didn't even begin until 2026, and is unlikely to hit 50,000 units in 2027.

I'd say a quarter million [Cybertrucks sold] a year is a reasonable guess and it might be 500,000, I don't know.

SOURCE
https://insideevs.com/news/667723/musk-estimates-tesla-could-sell-250000-500000-cybertrucks-yearly/
Cox Automotive / Kelley Blue Book reported that Tesla sold only 20,000 Cybertrucks in 2025.

Logan Kilpatrick: How long until [Artificial General Intelligence]?

Elon Musk: Next year

SOURCE
https://gizmodo.com/elon-musk-predicts-agi-by-2026-he-predicted-agi-by-2025-last-year-2000701007
In December 2025, Musk changed his prediction to 2026.

With our lower-cost vehicles, with the advent of autonomy, something like a 20% to 30% [sales] growth next year is my best guess.

SOURCE
https://www.cnbc.com/2024/10/24/tesla-shares-surge-as-analysts-react-to-q3-earnings-musk-predictions.html
In 2025, Tesla auto deliveries actually shrunk by 9%.

Howard Lutnick: But we set up DOGE - how much do you think we can rip out of this wasted $6.5 trillion Harris/Biden budget?

Elon Musk: Well I think we can do at least $2 trillion.

SOURCE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWSXmMiWTJ0
Musk missed his target by $2.5T, as government spending increased to $7.0T in fiscal year 2025.

I believe half of the population of the US will be covered by Tesla’s Robotaxi by the end of the year.

SOURCE
https://electrek.co/2025/07/23/elon-musk-with-straight-face-tesla-robotaxi-will-cover-half-us-population-end-year/
By the end of 2025, the Robotaxi operated fewer than 200 cars in just two cities.

SpaceX has already shifted focus to building a self-growing city on the Moon, as we can potentially achieve that in less than 10 years...SpaceX will also strive to build a Mars city and begin doing so in about 5 to 7 years.

SOURCE
https://x.com/elonmusk/status/2020640004628742577

You don’t seem to understand that SpaceX will be worth more than the rest of Earth if we accomplish our goals.

SOURCE
https://x.com/elonmusk/status/2075291102324641925

My prediction is that Optimus will be the biggest product of all time by far. Nothing will even be close. I think it'll be ten times bigger than the next biggest product ever made.

SOURCE
https://finance.yahoo.com/technology/ai/articles/elon-musk-says-tesla-robot-143135307.html

[F]ive years from now, my prediction is we will launch and be operating every year more AI in space than the cumulative total on Earth. I would expect it to be at least...a few hundred gigawatts per year.

SOURCE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYXbuik3dgA
The interviewer noted that just 100 gigawatts would require 10,000 Starship launches per year. In four years of tests, SpaceX has launched Starship 13 times.
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